Dress fragment, cloak fragment

This is one of of four embroidered fragments, said to be from silk mantle or cloak reportedly worn by King Charles I on the day of his execution on 30 January 1649. Like Charles I waistcoat, the object was donated by silk merchant Ernest Makower and his wife Rachel.

The object was donated to London Museum in 1929, together with a handwritten note in German, according to which 'the piece of the manntle of Charles I belonged to Countess Johanne Sophie, born Countess of Hohenlohe Langenburg, wife of Frederick Christian of Schaumburg Lippe. They lived serveral years in England at the Court of George I.' The note alludes to another note, which is stated to have been written in the Countess' hand. The Countess died in Stadthagen in 1743.

According to the second, handwritten note, the then two pieces, were from a mantle taken by the king's favourite valet Mr Herbert, when Charles I passed through the window of the Banqueting Hall onto the scaffold.The Countess received what was then two pieces from Herbert's daughter, Mrs. Stuart, who had kept it as 'a relic'.

Sir Thomas Herbert, first baronet (1606-1682), was indeed an attendant to the captive Charles I from the beginning of 1649. According to the entry for Herbert in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, the king gave him a pocket watch and 'it also appears that Herbert helped himself to other royal posessions'. Herbert and his wife Lucy had four sons and six daughters, but only one son and three daughters, Elizabeth, Lucie and Anne, survived their father. Eizabeth married Colonel Robert Phaire of Cork. Further research is required to see whether Lucie or Anne married a Mr Stuart.

Countess Johanna Sophia (1673-1743) became a friend of Electoral Princess Caroline of Brandenburg-Ansbach (1683-1737), later wife of George II, whom she accompanied to the United Kingdom (this must have been 1714 or later).

The very intricate, small scale embroidery is somewhat unusual for something like a cloak. Many items in UK museum collections are said to have been given by the king on the day of his execution, but it is often difficult if not impossibly to verify this claim.